The anti-tank missile system BARYE

The anti-tank long-range guided missile system BARYER, a design by the Kyiv-based State Design Bureau Luch, is intended to defeat armored targets at distances from 100 to 5,000 meters. The BARYER ATGM system comprises part of the SHKVAL remotely controlled unmanned turret for AFV applications, such as armored personnel carriers and armored infantry fighting vehicles, among them the all-new Ukrainian-designed APC’s BTR-3E1 and BTR-4, and the upgraded BMP-1M infantry fighting vehicle. The SHKVAL turret accommodates two BARYER ATGM containers with ready-to-launch missiles.

The BARYER ATGM system fi res unified antitank guided missiles R-2 which are common to the SKIF man-portable ATGM system. The missile is container-launched, and in this containerized configuration it has 1.27m in length and 0.13m in diameter, and weighs 16kg. The missile defeats armored infantry fighting vehicle (AIFV) protection systems of all kinds – be it a composite armor, active protection system, spaced armor or explosive reactive armor (ERA), and is capable of penetrating 800mm of Rolled Homogenous Armor (RHA) behind ERA.

The BARYER missile employs semiautomatic laser (SAL) guidance to enable the target, after being designated and lock-on, to be tracked automatically without further operator’s intervention (no man-in-the-loop scheme). For tracking the target, the operator employs a telescope sight, with the missile in flight being controlled and guided from a ground fi ring post. The target is designated and locked on using an optical tracker and a thermal-imaging sight, which allows 24-h operation in all weathers.

Equipping land forces with state-of-the-art anti-tank armaments would elevate them to a higher level of qualitaty – with commensurate benefits for their overall combat potential and the capability to conduct robust land warfare operations in adverse climates and weathers whereby defeating to best effect a variety of armored and other targets. Further development effort for Ukrainian ATGM systems will focus both on the design of new, predominantly third-generation examples, and also on the upgrade of the models currently in service with the Ukrainian Armed Forces, most of which are built based on the modularity concept.